


Brothers Share

by InnerSpectrum



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Brother Feels, Family Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-07
Updated: 2018-06-07
Packaged: 2019-05-19 07:46:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14869619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InnerSpectrum/pseuds/InnerSpectrum
Summary: Sherlock realizes Mycroft has had "a day", but that is not why he has come by Baker Street.





	Brothers Share

I am at my music stand debating between model sequences as I compose a new piece for John. Upper register makes it brighter, which is what I intended when I first thought of it. However, the lower register has such depth that resonates with me. Even as I ponder, I feel it when more notes in the lower register suddenly tumble in my brain.

I pick up my bow and play it. Oh, I do like that. Well, that decides it then.

I have written the new notes and am playing the phrase again, seeing where it takes me when I hear Mycroft coming up the stairs. The step squeaks and I blink, surprised.

He’s exhausted. Mycroft only hits that step when he’s at the end of his tether. I know he will never admit such, so I continue to play as though I have not noticed. It is only when he plops onto the sofa and drops his briefcase on the coffee table that I give pause. Only two things can push him to these levels of exhaustion and I have not seen, nor heard from him in almost a week. He should be on his way to work, still, he came here. I know he is here now because John is at the clinic today and will not be home for a few hours. I look at the need he will not ask for radiating from him.

Something is on his mind. He wants to talk.

As one of the very few people in this universe who truly understands him, he has come to me.

I put my bow and violin away.

The kettle was still hot so it is not long before a cup of tea is placed before him. Then I sit in John’s chair, wait and observe. It is a comfortable silence between he and I as we sip our respective teas.

His head lays back on the sofa and his eyes are closed, but he is not asleep. He has a migraine, by the way he frowns, but it is abating. He has not slept properly in at least two days. His left thumb nail is ragged. He picks at it when he’s reigning in his temper. Then something pleasant crosses his mind and I see his entire body relax.

_Oh, it has come that far has it?_

“Finally figured it out, have you?” I say quietly.

When he sits up our eyes meet. He knows I’ve been deducing him, he’s aware I know.

I want to tease him, it is always my first instinct with him, long ingrained in the roles we have played for each other, for the public. The roles that keep us safe. But we are not in the public now and I can see he is in no mood to play.

So, I give him my truths instead.

“I first guessed its possibility at the pool. When for a moment, the briefest moment, I thought he had betrayed me. The depth of that hurt had surprised me, but not nearly as much as the immediate relief moments later as I realized the truth. I did not have time to examine it then. In fact, I shoved it away so hard and fast in my mind palace at the moment that it was not until Irene that it resurfaced. When the CIA agent put a gun to John’s head, I _knew_. I knew I would do anything to keep him alive and happy. I could not promise to keep him safe with our lifestyle, but I would and have done everything to keep him alive. If not always happy.” I finished my tea as he lets my words and all they imply sink in.

“Magnusson was not for Mary, but for John.” My brother nodded in understanding, “Even though it nearly put you in exile and would have cost you your life? You knew this when you pulled that trigger, yet you did it anyway - for him.”

“Yes. I already knew how to live with a hurting heart. I had done so for years by that point. I would only have had to do so for another six months by your estimation.”

I see Mycroft’s jaw clench at that. Neither of us had known in that moment that it was my sister’s machinations which saved my life when she had Moriarty’s “Did you miss me?” flashed across every screen in the nation.

“Mary was what made him happy.  If it could not be me…” I stop, and get back on track “But… we are not talking about _me_.”

He smiles a little at that, understanding I know.

“I was interested in him...” He takes a sip of tea, picks up the cup and saucer and comes to sit across from me. Realizes I have given him my chair and dips his head in acknowledgement before his continues, “...at least a year before the whole Eurus and Sherrinford thing nearly destroyed us.”

I nod, mostly to myself. I had thought as much.

I can tell the connection only coalesced just then as he looks to me. “You knew. You sent Lestrade to me. You sent him to Sherrinford for me. You wanted _this_.”

“Yes.”

“Why, Sherlock?”

I look at his cup and see that he is finished. I take both cups and saucers to the kitchen and put them in the sink. I know he wonders what I am doing until he sees me take two low ball tumblers from the cupboard. He gets up and retrieves the good scotch from the shelf, then meets me at John’s chair to give us both healthy pours before we sit again.

“Because you and I are unique men, Brother Mine. It takes the unique to understand us, but it takes the extraordinary to truly love either one of us as we are.” I take a good swallow of the scotch enjoying the feel of it go down. “When I sent Greg to you I had just about given up hope that I would have any chance with John. I had no way of knowing then, that we would have what we do now. Yet, even then I refused to believe the universe would be so cruel as to let us both go without love. I had hope that if not me, then at least you could find that happiness.”

Mycroft was about to take a sip when he stops. I have done something rare, I have completely caught him off guard with the sentiment, with the knowledge that I honestly want to see him happy.

“I find I cannot gainsay you without being something of a hypocrite.” He says at last. “It is still a disadvantage. He has a target placed silently on his head by being with me. He knows this and loves me regardless. It places a target square over my heart for anyone to use against me. I know this…”

“Yet you love him regardless.”

“Yet I love him regardless.” He echoes. “I love him so much, Sherlock! I would do anything for him. I’ve denied myself this for so long. It frightens me to the core that I can have this. How he lets me know in so many ways that I am _allowed_ to be this happy. And by God, I am.”

The depth of feeling pouring from him, that he allows me to see this much emotion from him takes me by pleasant surprise. I knew he loved the man.

Now I know just how much.

“Welcome to my world.” I cannot resist the tease here.

He chuckles lightly and takes that delayed sip accepting the jest for what it is.

I watch him some more and see something else. I am honored that I am first.

“Not that you need or require it. You will do as your heart wants regardless. But you do request it. And I freely give it. I placed him in your path, in the hopes of this result, how can I deny either of you?” I raise my glass in salute. “When are you asking him?”

“After the joint mission between NSY and MI5. I don’t want the distraction for either of us.” Mycroft raises his glass to mine in acceptance of my blessing. I suspect a call to Mummy and Dad will follow this conversation. It will be equally well received.

“Welcome to the Holmes family Detective Inspector Gregory Lestrade. God help you.” I smile.


End file.
